Alan Shearer fears Newcastle exodus after Yohan Cabaye departure

Shearer is not impressed with the club's decision to sell Cabaye [GETTY]

The Toon legend insists a failure to fill the void left by the France midfielder’s £20m switch to Paris Saint-Germain will leave those left behind questioning their future - and the ambition of the club.

Joe Kinnear paid the price for collapsed last-gasp January moves for Lyon’s Clement Grenier and Montpellier star Remy Cabella when the director of football quit this week.

Shearer reckons Newcastle have messed-up by not having a cast-iron plan in place last month to replace Cabaye - and their inaction sends out the wrong message to fans as well as Alan Pardew’s squad.

The 43-year-old former Newcastle and England skipper said: “Joe Kinnear was quoted as saying that no-one would be leaving in January.

“But if you’re going to let your best player go, you have to have a plan for someone to come in. You can’t let Cabaye leave and then bring no-one else in. That just can’t happen.

“It sends a bad message out to the fans and, if you’re a player in that dressing room, you must be thinking, ‘where are we going?’”

Newcastle’s season is in danger of fizzling out after suffering defeat in five of their last seven games and with tough matches against Chelsea and Tottenham on the horizon.

Cabaye was a key presence in the Magpies midfield before being sold to PSG [AFP]

Shearer feels a good cup run would have helped to take the heat off owner Mike Ashley and boss Alan Pardew - only for the Geordies to bow out early in both the FA Cup and Capital One Cup partly down to resting key squad members.

“It sends a bad message out to the fans and, if you’re a player in that dressing room, you must be thinking, ‘where are we going?'”

Alan Shearer

Shearer told talkSPORT: “They’re in a decent position in the league, but they are not going to finish in the top four so the two cups are the only things they had a chance of wining.

“So I don’t get them resting players in those competitions because these are the trophies that the likes of Newcastle need to go for. Resting players in cup competitions I just don’t get.

“It’s not as if they are in Europe and playing 65 games this season. They went out at the first hurdle in the FA Cup, and played three games in the Capital One Cup.

“That means they’ll have 43 games this season, and that’s not a lot of games to ask a professional player to play.”